On August 7th, 2016, two-time grantee and Deputy Scientific Director, Nir Barzilai, MD, and 1990 AFAR Research Grant recipient, Judith Campisi, PhD, were featured in The Toronto Star’s round up for promising projects in the aging research.
In an article titled “The Search for the ‘Holy Grail’ of Aging Research,” The Star noted exciting advancements in aging research including promising studies looking at rapamycin and metformin as potential intervention for targeting aging. As Drs. Campisi and Barzilai pointed out, the main goal of these projects in better health, not life extension.
“Neither (the FDA) nor us want to say aging is a disease,” said Dr. Barzilai, who is the lead investigator on the Targeting Aging with Metformin (TAME) trial. “I think of the biology of aging as the risk factor for all of those diseases, and that’s what we want to target.”
Nir Barzilai, MD, is the Director of the Institute for Aging Research at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and a two-time AFAR grant recipient.
Judith Campisi, PhD is a Professor at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging.
Spearheaded by Dr. Barzilai and AFAR Scientific Director Steven Austand, PhD, with board members board members S. Jay Olshansky, Phd, and James Kirkland, MD, Phd, TAME is a novel study that will test whether Metformin can delay the onset of age-related diseases and conditions including cancer, cardio vascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and cognitive decline. If this study succeeds, it will pave the way for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to consider aging as a treatable condition. Learn more here.
